CONSISTENT WITH THE GOALS OF PROGRAM AREA A1401, THIS PROPOSAL IS A RESEARCH PROJECT LEADING TO FOUNDATIONAL KNOWLEDGE OF PLANT AND SOIL HEALTH. THE PROJECT FOCUSES ON INTERACTIONS BETWEEN ANTHROPOGENIC NITROGEN (N), PLANTS, AND MICROBES. THE OVERALL OBJECTIVE IS TO DEVELOP KNOWLEDGE THAT TRANSLATES TO MORE EFFICIENT N UTILIZATION, WITH ENHANCEMENT OF CROP YIELDS AND REDUCTION IN N LOSSES FROM FIELDS. THE MAJOR AGRICULTURAL N SOURCES, UREA AND CARBAMYLATED UREAS, WILL BE STUDIED. DICARBAMYLUREA WAS PREVIOUSLY CONSIDERED TO BE AN EASY-TO-FORMULATE, SLOW-RELEASE N FERTILIZER, BUT A VIABLE INDUSTRIAL SYNTHESIS DID NOT EXIST. THE SYNTHESIS AND FATE OF THIS N NUTRIENT WILL BE EXAMINED IN DETAIL HERE. RESULTS IN OUR LABORATORIES TO DATE SHOW DICARBAMYLUREA IS METABOLIZED BY MICROBES BUT NOT BY CROP PLANTS. ITS FLUX, FATE AND TRANSPORT WILL BE FOLLOWED BY 15N-LABELLING EXPERIMENTS. CROP (CORN AND POTATO) TOLERANCE WILL BE DETERMINED IN GREENHOUSE AND FIELD STUDIES. MICROBIAL METABOLISM OF CARBAMYLATED UREA COMPOUNDS WILL BE STUDIED. WE WILL MINE A DATA SET CONSISTING OF 50,000+ SEQUENCED GENOMES FROM BACTERIA ASSOCIATED WITH PLANTS AND SOILS. THE KEY PERSONNEL DIRECTING THE PROJECT CONSIST OF THREE PIS FROM TWO UNIVERSITIES. ONE IS A MAJOR LAND GRANT UNIVERSITY, THE OTHER IS AN UNDERGRADUATE INSTITUTION WITH 46% NON-WHITE ENROLLMENT. EDUCATIONAL MODULES WILL BE INTEGRATED INTO THE CONDUCT OF THE RESEARCH. A RESEARCH DATABASE WILL BE DEVELOPED TO DISSEMINATE INFORMATION PUBLICLY AND WILL ALSO BE USED EDUCATIONALLY.